Moongazing

Congress reacts to letters like the tides to the moon, and in election time the moon is full. Thus, when UMT ran into a welter of hostile letters, Congress sent it back to the Armed Services Committee.

This did not cut down the letters, however; it only altered their source. Immediately after the vote, Representative Vinson and other UMT proponents began receiving a large number of letters urging them to "keep plugging," and the tide turned. Speaker Rayburn has just announced the possibility of a new vote.

According to the Speaker, a parliamentary maneuver forced Congress to vote on the UMT bill as it was before the Armed Services Committee had saddled it with amendments, and this assured its defeat. This time the softened bill will be submitted.

Like the tides however, the Speaker is a little behind the moon. The proposal he refers to as UMT is not really a universal military training program at all, and even if Congress approves it, those who instructed Vinson to keep plugging will not get what they are supporting. Instead, they will get a program limited to five years, one that cannot be set in motion until the present military draft has been lifted, and one where the trainees cannot be inducted until yet another Congressional vote. In addition to these crippling amendments, they will get only a training program, which is not adequate for the needs of a nation threatened with an unpredictable number of little wars and possibly a large one as well.

If this UMT bill actually passes Congress, the issue will be dead. Its inadequacy will make no difference, for the tide will have run out permanently. If Speaker Rayburn and Representative Vinson are really looking at the moon, and not some incandescent globe they have set up themselves, they will stop trying to appease hostile Representatives and present Congress with a full UMST program.